Nowhere Boys with somewhere to go

Philippa Hawker

Dougie Baldwin and Rahart Adams have the relaxed rapport that comes from spending a lot of time together in very particular circumstances. "Once you've all been trudging through the Dandenong Ranges in freezing weather at 4am, you become pretty tight," Baldwin says. That was part of the job on Nowhere Boys, the award-winning Australian children's TV series that gave them their first lead roles.

After two seasons, the producers have decided to bring the story to the big screen; Nowhere Boys: The Book Of Shadows, directed by David Caesar, introduces some new angles to a series that began in 2013. It's the tale of four teenage boys with seemingly little in common who discovered a shared destiny that involved spells, superpowers and an alternate universe, as well as the more familiar challenges of adolescent life. Baldwin, 19, plays Felix a Goth with an interest in magic; Adams, 19, is Sam, the amiable, popular boy; Matt Testro (the jock) and Joel Lok (the nerd) are the remaining members of the quartet.

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Trailer: Nowhere Boys: The Book of Shadows

On the verge of separating, the Nowhere Boys are drawn together for one last spell when Felix discovers a magically sealed 'Book of Shadows' that releases a powerful force of chaos.

In Book Of Shadows, the four have grown apart, but need to find a way to reconnect to avert disaster. Angourie Rice – who starred in These Final Hours, and plays Ryan Gosling's daughter in a forthcoming Hollywood drama,The Nice Guys – joins the cast as a mysterious newcomer to the school. Both say they were struck by her talent and maturity, and what she brought to the role.

As young actors, Adams and Baldwin are doing what they've wanted to do from their earliest years. Baldwin remembers "running around the house dressing up and filming myself". His older sister, Nathalie Antonia, is an actor, "and she passed my name on to my agent and got it started for me". He plays Shawn Wheeler, member of the drag-racing family in the series Upper Middle Bogan. His passion is comedy, and further down the track he'd like to explore the possibility of writing and creating his own material.

Adams always knew that he wanted to be an entertainer. "Whether it would be in music, or acting, or dancing, I always wanted to do something where I could express myself." He started as a dancer, "trying my hand at everything, I did ballet, hip-hop, breakdancing, jazz, tap, you name it, I've tried it". An injury while practising a hip-hop stunt stopped him from dancing for some time "and it was kind of a blessing in disguise, because that's when things really started taking off for me with acting".

He had a role in Neighbours as a bad-boy bully who shook up Ramsay Street for several episodes, and after the first season of Nowhere Boys he landed a lead role in a Nickelodeon series called Every Witch Way. He is currently working on Emo:The Musical, a low-budget feature from writer-director Neil Triffett. He gets to sing, but not to dance – "emos don't really dance" – and it's very different from anything he's done before, he says with relish. "I play the role of Bradley, who's basically the villain. I can't wait for it to come out."

Shortly he'll head off to the US for pilot season, that round of auditions and meetings that has become an annual feature of many Australian actors' schedules: that's how he landed Every Witch Way. You can't really prepare for it, he says, you simply have to go with the flow. "You have to go there with faith in your own ability to perform."

Baldwin will also head to the US for pilot season. After May, when the third season of Upper Middle Bogan wraps, he thinks he might go travelling He approaches the pilot season philosophically – there are hundreds of pilots up for consideration, but only a few go into production. "But there's so much good material, and it's really exciting even to be considered for some things." There's also a kind of freedom in the scale, range and uncertainty of it all. "When I'm here, I know all the casting directors by now, and closer to home, it's more nerve-wracking. But in LA, I'm such an alien, so there's no pressure."